Silicon Microgravity raises £6m led by West Hill Capital with Oxford Innovation Finance
This article covers Silicon Microgravity, a Cambridge-based deep-tech startup, which has raised £6m in a growth funding round led by West Hill Capital with participation from the UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund and a follow-on from Oxford Innovation Finance. The funding will be used to scale UK manufacturing and accelerate commercial deployment of its MEMS inertial and gravity sensors for GPS-limited navigation, defence, space and subsurface imaging markets.
Silicon Microgravity has raised £6 million in a growth funding round led by West Hill Capital, with participation from the UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund (UKI2S) and a follow-on investment from Oxford Innovation Finance via its Oxford Innovation EIS Growth Fund. The Cambridge company will use the capital to scale UK manufacturing and push commercial deployments of its MEMS-based inertial and gravity sensors in GPS-limited navigation, defence, space and subsurface imaging markets.
Why it matters
High-performance inertial sensors and gravity detectors are core components for navigation where GPS is unreliable or unavailable, from autonomous systems to space missions. For industries such as defence, aerospace and minerals exploration, more accurate and robust MEMS sensors can reduce dependency on external signals and enable operations in contested or remote environments. Funding that supports domestic manufacturing also matters for the UK’s industrial capability in deep-tech hardware.
Inside the product
Silicon Microgravity, known as SMG, develops microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) accelerometers, gyroscopes and gravity sensors engineered to operate in demanding conditions. The company says its gravity-sensing technology can be used for subsurface imaging to detect underground density variations, a capability relevant to critical mineral exploration and infrastructure assessment. SMG is positioning its sensors for integration into navigation stacks used where GPS access is degraded, including autonomous platforms and space programmes.
Who are the investors?
The round was led by West Hill Capital. The UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund (UKI2S) also took part. Oxford Innovation Finance made a follow-on investment through its Oxford Innovation EIS Growth Fund; this marks Oxford Innovation Finance’s second investment in SMG, following its initial backing in 2023.
In the announcement, Richard Cooper, Managing Director at Oxford Innovation Finance, said:
Silicon Microgravity is developing highly differentiated MEMS technology with the potential to address important challenges in navigation, sensing and subsurface imaging. Since our initial investment in 2023, the company has continued to develop its technology and progress its commercial opportunities. We’re pleased to be investing again as part of this latest funding round, supporting the team as it scales its UK manufacturing capability and brings its technology to a wider range of markets.
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Founder perspective
In the announcement, Francis Neill, CEO at Silicon Microgravity, said:
We’re pleased to have Oxford Innovation Finance continuing to support Silicon Microgravity through this latest investment. Their backing through its EIS Fund in both 2023 and now reflects the progress we’ve made and the opportunity ahead for our technology. The funding will help us expand our engineering and manufacturing capacity in the UK and accelerate commercial deployment across defence, space and other markets where high-performance sensing and navigation are increasingly important. This frames the raise as focused on scaling manufacturing and converting existing technical development into commercial contracts across Europe and the United States.
The bigger picture
Hardware-led navigation and sensing remains a capital-intensive segment of the UK and European deep-tech ecosystem. SMG’s raise underlines continuing investor interest in defence and space-grade MEMS, plus the growing commercial case for gravity sensing beyond traditional geophysics. For the UK, boosting domestic manufacturing of specialised sensors ties into broader industrial priorities around security, supply chain resilience and the ability to support aerospace and defence programmes.
As MEMS and inertial navigation technologies move from lab prototypes to fielded systems, follow-on funding and manufacturing investment will be important to secure international partnerships and exports. The outcome of this funding round will be watched by others in the hardware and sensing space as a barometer of investor appetite for capital-intensive, deep-tech hardware startups in the UK and Europe.
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